TNE0440

"Hmm. That is a good question. Some say that her name is Bilqis, but..."

"Wrong again!" His tone was condescending, "I will give you a million dollars if you can find the name Bilqis written on any stone."

He smirked and then left. Later I could see that he was having an animated conversation with Ms. Phillips and it appeared to be something regarding us.

The Alphabet contains basic, distinct geometric shapes that correspond to established phonetic sounds. Certain letters have more than one symbol so that they can be used consecutively with either inclusion or exclusion of the corresponding word. Earlier attempts to translate the symbols failed because the alphabet was believed to be proto-Arabic. This was a natural assumption since the symbols were first seen only in the Sinai and the Arabian peninsula. However, translations have successfully been made by using an old Semitic dialect that predates Hebrew.

Sky and I returned to her room to talk and rest. I was not there for long before our guide, Ahmed, knocked on the door and asked to speak with me.

"Mister Dan, the workers of the Sheba temple are now doing their qat chewing in a room and they have invited for you to come and speak with them. Come on. This will be good for you."

Recent photos of the excavated palace of Sheba. Wall enclosure in background.

The palace of the Queen Sheba with columns stands off-set from the wall at left

Sky and I exited the hotel and followed Ahmed to a small shed, lined with cushions, where about a dozen Yemeni men were sitting and inspecting bundles of the green leaves. There was a large pot of hot chai and they welcomed us to sit with them. The Yemeni men were not permitted inside the hotel. These were the laborers who did the actual digging and assisted in the translation and documenting of the artifacts. They were also local tribesmen and were keeping an eye on the work that was done in their territory.

"So, Mister Dan, please you tell us about your work."

I asked for a paper and pencil and drew the complete Sabaean alphabet. Along side I drew the phonetic equivalent, in English, and Ahmed helped to draw the Arabic letters. They passed the paper around while chewing the qat and it seemed to stimulate a lively discussion that I could not understand.

"Mister Dan. This letter here you say is Lamed ..." he pointed to a vertical line, "Mohammed says this letter is a space, a place holder between words, and is not a part of the alphabet..."

I was familiar enough with the Himyaritic system to know that this was true. But again I was surprised that the more recent alphabet, which originated in a few hundred years BC, was being applied to the Sabaean texts that were written almost a thousand years earlier.

"Mister Dan, the men want to know if you have verbs and words with this method or if you get names of people with this?" Ahmed was busy listening to their conversation and translating important parts for me

to understand.

"Yes. It tells a story. There are names but there are also verbs and many nouns."

I waited for Ahmed to translate what I had said. This made the conversation become very loud and the men smiled at me and nodded their head in approval.

"The men here say that they have thought this symbol was not a word space and they seem to think that your way is correct."

Just then there was silence. Mohammed was standing in the door. The Yemeni men seemed embarrassed by their conversation and they looked at each other like misbehaving children caught in the act. Mohammed sat beside me and asked me my background.

"So how long have you been studying the Himyaritic language? I have been doing it for over twenty years. It is my life's work. But for you, it is a fun hobby, yes?"

I could tell that he felt threatened and wanted to insult me. I explained that I did not use the Himyaritic dialect to do the

translations but used a form of proto-Canaanite.

"Proto-Canaanite? I have never heard of this. This is like the Torah

then? Hebrew?" There was a pronounced condescension in the way he said "Hebrew."

He then raised his voice and spoke in Arabic. I did not understand a

word, but he had many words to say and became quite animated and red in the face. The Yemeni workers who had been listening to us in silence

tried to calm him down by making gestures with small bouquets of their qat leaves and telling him, in Arabic, to calm down. But it wasn't working.

Eventually Ahmed told us that it was time to leave. I asked for a translation of Mohammed's comments but he refused to repeat it, perhaps out of respect for me, and merely ushered us away from the shed and back to the hotel. Later that evening we saw Mohammed and Ms. Phillips arguing again.

The next morning we had been scheduled to inspect the Sheba site. Our guide, Ahmed, seemed nervous and avoided eye contact. Something was wrong. "Mister Dan. I am sorry that I made you go there last night.

That was not right of him to say those things. And so today they will not allow us to see the site."

It was obvious what had happened. I met some of the Yemeni workers later. They explained that Mohammed had found many texts that did not translate, and he had assumed the texts referred to family names, or tribal names, that were arranged in a lengthy lineage around the wall. The fact that the text could be understood using a different dialect

was something he either could not, or did not want to make public. They apologized for his bad conduct, smiled, and offered me qat as a token of their friendship.

We spent the afternoon visiting the Mareb dam, where I photographed some old texts, and to the completely excavated Temple of the Sun, where there were also rare scripts that had never been translated. While these events were going on, Sky became silent and distant. A few times I went to visit her room and she was not there. She began to seclude herself and write in her journal. I didn't mind this as much as

it worried me to have her wander off on her own. We were still in a foreign land and I felt a responsibility to protect her.

(Below) Temple of the Sun, close to the palace of Sheba and the wall enclosure

The next day we would be heading for the most remote part of Arabia where there was nothing but hundreds of miles of sand and sun. Known as the Empty Quarter, this bland landscape would require the escort of Bedouin guides.

The Empty Quarter was not empty. In fact it was there that we encountered something so strange that mere words will not suffice to tell the story. Something strange happened and it changed everything. It was the best thing, and the worst thing that could have happened. It was unbelievable, yet it happened to us.

Chapter 25 - Our First Encounter

The trip from Mareb to the Empty Quarter was safe. There were few hiding places for potential ambushes by rogue tribes and so our armed escort was not needed. We made sure to have plenty of bottled water and Abdul let some of the air out of his Toyota's tires.

Abdul sat in front with Nasser and Sky and I shared the back seat with Ahmed. On hot and bumpy trips we had learned how to fold our knees to absorb the movement and this usually was relaxing enough to allow us to

take naps while Abdul drove us to the next destination.

The flyer in the window says “Viewzone Expedition 2001 Yemen”

There was an air of sadness and regret over the conflict with Mohammed. I tried my best to make everyone feel good and explained that the Sheba site would only have been a formality, since I already had all of the photographs of the text, and that the new sites, the old dam and the Temple of the Sun, were perhaps more useful in my work. Nevertheless, my dream of standing near the palace where the Queen lived, and where her only son was likely buried with the Ark, was gone.

As we headed towards the expanse of yellow sand, Sky became agitated and began writing in her journal. She was quiet again. I sensed something was wrong but I could not see her face under the black veil.

As we approached the last of the visible canyons, the flat, bright horizon lay ahead. The sky was blue and we were all enjoying the view. To the left of the car, a mile ahead, we noticed a single, large, round cloud that was casting a shadow on the bright sand. The cloud was

unusual because it was somewhat low, perhaps a few hundred feet, and it was the only cloud we had seen since leaving Sana'a.

I pointed out the cloud to everyone and we all acknowledged it. We watched it as we approached its shadow to the left of the highway, and I estimated it was no more than 100 feet in diameter. Within a few minutes we were almost under it. I had the best vantage because of my seat next to the rear left window. I stuck my head out to look up at it as we passed.

As I watched the cloud up close it began to shrink, as if collapsing on itself. I was speechless as it got smaller and smaller until only a bright spot remained, at which point it disappeared with a bright flash of light.

The driver, Abdul, also witnessed this and said something in Arabic while he slowed the Toyota. We stopped and looked into the sky, but the cloud was gone.

"Wow. Have you ever seen anything like that before?" Sky asked.

"No." That was all anyone could say. "Never." There was an uncomfortable silence in the car as we headed off the road and on to the sand of the desert.

Since there were no roads in the Empty Quarter, we had a rendezvous with two young Bedouin men who were hired to drive ahead of us in their pickup and guide us to our next destination, the ruins of the Ishtar Temple outside of Shibam.

The drive was a long one, lasting a few hours, and the heat was intense. We arrived at the ruins just before dark and set up tents near the vehicles. While Abdul and Nasser prepared to cook our dinner, Sky, Ahmed and I went to explore the desert at some distance from the campsite.

I could tell that something was wrong with Sky. She had been very quiet and moody. I asked her to talk about it and she left Ahmed to speak with me privately.

"I had a message. A woman's voice gave me a message just as we left Mareb." She removed her veil and I could see the expression on her face. This was no joke.

"What do you mean, a message?"

She paused and spoke slowly, "I know you were here but it was not the time." Sky was almost in tears and I was frozen in place. "I heard it

in my head and she repeated it a couple of times. I wanted to say something but I couldn't. I wrote it down..."

"So. Everything is fine?" Ahmed interrupted us. "Look, over here!"

We looked at the horizon and noticed the bright disc of a full moon just coming into view. I wanted to say more to Sky but it would have to wait. The sky grew dark but the light from the rising moon was bright enough to cast a shadow. Sky found a stick and drew a large circle in the smooth sand and we watched Abdul and Nasser starting a fire, with the help of the Bedouin guides, near the parked vehicles in the distance.

"Come. It is time to go back. They have some hot chai ready for us." We

followed Ahmed back to the group and were surprised to find that dinner was ready.

"Hey, that cloud was strange today." I tried to make conversation as we ate. The Bedouins asked what I meant by this and Nasser described the incident in Arabic. The Bedouins did not laugh. They ate in silence and kept glancing up at the sky where a beautiful canopy of stars was shining.

"Mister Dan? You have heard about the one thousand Arabian nights? Well this is one thousand and one stars! It is beautiful, yes?" Nasser was

right. It was beautiful. The moon was especially bright and clear. I

could see the craters and detail with my bare eyes and suggested that I might try to film the Moon with a camera after dinner.

Ahmed joined us as I carried the video camera to the spot where Sky had drawn the circle in the sand. The Moon was so bright that we found it without too much trouble. I set the camera on a tripod and captured the image while Sky and Ahmed gazed at the stars.

"Look up here," Ahmed was pointing to an unusually bright star. "What is that? Is maybe an airplane?" We watched the bright object as it seemed to move against the stationary backdrop of stars.

The object seemed too bright for a star, yet it lacked the typical colored lights of an airplane. I had suggested it might be a satellite

but, as we watched it, it moved from side to side and then up and down.

Sky was fascinated by it and began to walk into the desert in its direction. I kept looking at the light, trying to imagine what it could be. I followed Sky for a short distance but soon lost sight of her in the dim light. I returned to Ahmed who was sitting near my tripod.

"What do you think it is?" I asked. Ahmed told me he had not seen anything like this before. He seemed concerned and suggested that we return to the car where the tents were set up for us. I told him that I would look for Sky and Ahmed offered to bring my camera back to the car.

I found Sky a few yards away, sitting in the sand and staring at the light. It seemed to move quickly now and it varied in brightness. I sat with Sky and noticed she had been crying.

"Are you okay?" I was worried until I saw her smile.

"Yes. I'm fine. I think I can talk to them. I am communicating with them. Something just happened and they spoke to me."

Sky explained that while she was walking away from me she had experienced a sudden burst of light in her head and had fallen to the sand. She then noticed the light had flashed brightly and she sensed that, whatever it was, it was attempting to communicate with her. She

asked me to let her be alone for a while and assured me that she would be fine by herself. Her smile and calm voice were reassuring and so I walked back to the fire and the rest of the group.

When I returned to the group, the Bedouins were also looking at the strange light as it moved in the sky. Ahmed asked where Sky was and I explained that she wanted to look at the light for a while. In a humorous tone I suggested that she might be trying to talk to it, but the joke was not received well and the Bedouins were especially upset at this.

There was a lively discussion in Arabic. It was the first of many times that I would hear the word "jinn" used. Ahmed insisted that we should bring Sky back to the tents but I told him to wait there while I asked her to return.

I found Sky sitting in the middle of the circle she had drawn earlier. She was smiling and appeared very excited and happy. "I've done it. I figured out how to communicate. Watch this."

In a low voice she asked a question that I could not hear clearly. But as soon as she had finished the light flashed and changed position. She repeated this several times with the same result.

"Mister Dan! Where are you?" I could hear Ahmed getting impatient for us to return.

As we began to walk back towards the campfire a fierce wind began to blow the sand. It got stronger with each step and soon the sand was obscuring the stars and darkening the light of the Moon. We were a hundred meters from the camp when Sky stopped walking and spoke up. "If you want us to continue talking to you then you must stop this wind."

Not many people will believe what happened next. The wind died instantly. I watched in disbelief as the grains of sand ceased to move and fell to the desert floor. In less than a second there was silence.

The wind had almost blown our tents away and the group were scurrying to secure them by placing heavy items inside. The fire was almost extinguished and the Bedouins were crouched against their pickup truck with their AK47’s clutched in their hands.

I could have dismissed the events if I had been drinking or stoned, but I was not. And if these were the only times we had this experience then I might have conveniently forgotten about it, but it wasn't. Instead it

was only the beginning of many strange events that would forever change us all.

The odd events had obviously upset the two young Bedouin men that guided us through the Empty Quarter. They stayed long enough to have morning chai and then hurried away, but only after they spoke with Ahmed in Arabic. I heard that word again, "Jinn."

The Ishtar Temple was a remote site with almost no writing. It was originally made from stone, including some of the strangest purple rock I had ever seen. We spend the morning walking through the ruins before heading East towards the city of Shibam.

Shibam was an odd site. Mud and brick constructed buildings towered over the flat desert at seven stories high and we wandered through the narrow streets and the maze of alleys, taking photographs and meeting the friendly people.

The temperature was hot. We had a thermometer with a scale that ended at 130 F and the needle remained stuck to this temperature for most of the day. Abdul wanted to drive us to a cooler location to spend the night, but he got lost in the Wadi Hadhramout valley and we ended up in a small village called Sif.

Sif had only hotel and it was a modest one. Our rooms were small and had no sheets. The heat was intense but the hotel had large ceiling fans in each room. After we ate dinner, we were too hot to remain outside and we all went to our rooms to enjoy the fans and sleep.

After a few hours, well after midnight, the electrical power suddenly died and the fans stopped working. I tried to continue sleeping but it was impossible. I left my room and used the stairs to reach the top of the hotel roof where I found Sky smoking a cigarette. She had been there for some time.

"There are three of them. Look." Sky was crouching against the wall and looking up at three bright lights that were widely separated in the

dark sky. "There's a red one and a blue one now."

With the lights all out, the sky was very clear. There was a bright light overhead, similar to the one we had seen in the Empty Quarter. I thought it was a planet at first, but it was much too bright and it was moving from side to side against the stationary stars. It looked to be about the size of a car. I guessed it was a few hundred feet overhead. Towards the horizon there was a similar light, but this one had a red hue to it and it was slowly moving across the star field towards the first light.

"Okay. Wow. Where's the third one?" I sat next to Sky. She pointed up to the opposite horizon and I followed her finger. The third light was not as bright but it was blue. It was also moving, even more rapidly than the red light.

"I figured out a way to communicate with them." Sky told me that she had been observing them from the roof for some time that night and had been asking them questions that could be answered either "yes" or "no." She said that the light, the white one, would respond by moving either vertically or horizontally to signal its answer.

"There are three of them. But when I asked them if they were just three